22 Easy Things You Can Do To Help Save the Earth

New Here? Welcome! Dear Wendy is a relationship advice blog. You can peruse the archives here and read here. You can also follow along on Facebook,Twitter, and Instagram. If you have a relationship/dating question I can help answer, you can send me your letters at wendy@dearwendy.com.Thanks for visiting!

This is a site all about relationships, and one of the most important relationships any of us has is with our planet. And, y’all, it’s a pretty dysfunctional relationship at this point. We are abusing it, arguably beyond repair. But if we act quickly and smartly, we can at least slow down the effects of our abuse and mis-use. In honor of Earth Day today, and inspired by friend Jeramy Zimmerman who started sharing planet-saving tips on Facebook this month, here are 22 easy things — Easy! — you can do to help save our Earth. On their own, they may not seem like a lot, but if each of you committed to doing even a few of them, let alone all of them, we could have a big impact.

(These first five are borrowed, with permission, from my friend Jeramy’s Facebook page):

1. Stop wasting food.
30-40% of usable food in the US goes to waste. Buy what you’ll cook. Cook as much as you’ll eat. Not going to get to it in time? Freeze it! Those were Jeramy’s tips, and I’ll add this: shop more frequently (we hit the grocery store almost every day to buy what we’ll need to cook dinner); when you have a spare 10 minutes, chop your veggies and store them in a container in the fridge so you’ll be more apt to throw them in a recipe when you’re cooking and use them up before they go bad; make some rice or pasta or couscous or whatever grain/carb you favor 2-3 times a week to have on hand for a quick stir-fry when you need to use up veggies or meat; don’t buy more fresh fruit than you and your family can eat in the next three days.

2. Put down the Charmin.
Have you been to other developed nations? Have you used their toilet paper? Have you noticed that whole productive countries are able to wipe their butts on something less soft than a down comforter? People act like our only choices are triple-ply luxury or sand paper. It ain’t true. Pick up a roll of Seventh Generation – it works just fine. You don’t need to use more of it. It doesn’t put chemicals and bleach close to some of your most vital organs. If you’ve got a horrible cold and your nose is all cracked and painful, by all means buy a box of Puffs with Aloe. Aside from that, use more responsible paper products. (Note: I have made the switch to Seventh Generation and it’s fine. It gets the job done and I can feel good about keeping my carbon footprint a little smaller).

3. Step away from the bag.
Plastic bags are one of our most ubiquitous, unnecessary evils. For a week, vow not to take one. Carry your own bag to the supermarket. Stuff a reusable bag (or even an old plastic bag) into your bag in case you stop for something on the way home. If you have a car, keep reusable grocery bags there. Just picking up one thing? Skip the bag all together. [And if, like me, you still use grocery plastic bags some of the time just to have a bag for cat litter, consider making the switch to these compostable pet waste bags — Wendy]

4. Drop the bottle.
What’s that in your hand? Bottled water? Don’t you know that bottles are for wine? How many bottles of water did you consume this week? None? Good job. Some? Cut it out. Get yourself a plastic or metal bottle. Refill it (for free) at any drinking fountain or in your own kitchen. We live in a country with very clean water. Afraid that people will think you’re poor if you aren’t carrying fancy water? Get a gold-plated, jewel encrusted water bottle of your own.

5. Hold the phone.
Our electronics contain an alarming amount of harmful stuff. Most harmful, of course, to those who make the products and those who live near where they’re dumped. And you want a new iPhone. I know, so do I. But hold on to the one you’ve got for just a few more months. Resist that urge to constantly upgrade. When you do get a new one, take the time to sell your old one. Donate the money to an organization focused on cleaning up toxic messes.

[Thank you, Jeramy, for the first five tips. These next 17 are my own.]

7. Use reusable sandwich bags and lunch bags or sandwich tupperware.
I’m committing to this change since we are guilty of using disposable baggies for our sandwiches. I’m going with the sandwich-size tupperware, but I’ve heard the reusable bags are OK, too, if that’s your preference.

8. Turn off the water while brushing your teeth.

9. Participate in clothing swaps.
This is a great motivation to go through your closets and drawers, gather up the stuff you no longer wear, get a group of friends together, and get rid of the stuff you don’t want while maybe getting a few new-to-you pieces to wear and enjoy.

10. Go vegetarian once a week.
Not only are the health benefits numerous, but going meatless even one day a week saves tons of earth’s resources and energy. “The United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organization estimates the meat industry generates nearly one-fifth of man-made greenhouse gas emissions. An estimated 1,800 to 2,500 gallons of water go into a single pound of beef. And, on average, about 40 calories of fossil fuel energy go into every calorie of feed lot beef in the U.S. Compare this to the 2.2 calories of fossil fuel energy needed to produce one calorie of plant-based protein. Moderating meat consumption is a great way to cut fossil fuel demand.” [via]

13. Take shorter showers and cut back on baths.
Swap at least one of your regular baths with a short shower. When you do take a bath, don’t fill the water up to your shoulders.

14. Carpool, walk, bike, take public transportation.
I live in a city where I can easily get around without a car, but when I lived in a different city where public transportation was much less reliable (sorry, Chicago, but it’s true), I carpooled a lot. It was a great way to save on gas money AND get to know my neighbors/classmates/co-workers a little better. And when it was nice out, I biked everywhere and was in great shape, which was a win-win-win (good for my wallet, waistline, and the planet).

16. Buy (or rent!) gently-used items.
Not everything you own or use needs to be brand-spanking new. Check eBay, Craigslist, Etsy, Rent the Runway, FreeCycle.org, or your neighborhood listservs or FaceBook pages for items that you need that other people want to get rid of or loan for a low (or, often, no) cost. This practice is especially beneficial for items that you won’t use for very long — like baby products and clothes that your kid will outgrow in a few months (or weeks!).

17. Pass along your gently-used items to people who can use them.
Done with your crap? Pass it along. Surely, there are other people who can use what you no longer want. Maybe you can even make a few bucks to go buy more crap (or donate to good causes!).

17. Buy Local.
Whenever possible, buy from local farmers (CSA!) or farmers’ markets, supporting your local economy and reducing the amount of greenhouse gas created when products are flown or trucked in.

18. Tell your dry cleaners to hold the plastic (and return their hangers to them).
You know how dry cleaners like to wrap every item in tons of plastic? It’s unnecessary. Ask yours not to do this. Bring a bag to carry you freshly-laundered items home.

19. Bring your own coffee mug to the coffee shop (or, better yet, just make your own at home).
Use a spoon to stir — not one of the wood stirrers — and skip that cup-cover thingy that’s supposed to keep you from burning your hand on the cup.

20. Save the bows from gifts you receive and re-use them when it’s your turn to wrap a gift.

Bonus: Compost your food waste! This is next on my list. Here in NYC, we have compost drop-off sites at our city farmers’ markets, which makes it pretty easy to compost most food waste. I don’t know why I’ve been dragging my heels on this, but I’m going to start composting my family’s food scraps, keeping them out of landfills and helping to improve the quality of soil in our community.

Because he’s in my way, and there’s only one shower head so someone’s always not in the water. There is literally nothing enjoyable about it to me. If it were purely for sexytime purposes, maybe. But if it’s for the purpose of getting clean, no. Get the fuck out of my shower.

Yes! We do this every single morning, and it’s awesome. If you think about it, you don’t need the water every moment in the shower, so it makes sense to share and swap places based on who needs the water when. That way it’s not just running over two people when they dont’ need it.

Also a lot of adjustable shower heads have a low/no water setting. So rather than having it going full blast while you’re shampooing or shaving or whatnot, you can turn down the water without messing up the temperature when you turn it back on.

those are great! and really easy to use and not hard to install. it’s also hard to tell if you’re actually cutting back time wise, so there are some shower timers out there that you can set for 5 mins, etc and an alarm goes off when you’re done.

Nothing chaps my hide more than when I see someone buy a huge cart full of Organic Groceries, and not use a single reusable cloth bag. Ooh, it makes me MAD!!! I try to just assume they normally use them but forgot them that day…

But seriously, cloth bags people. You can fit SO much more in them, and you can use them for all sorts of other things, too!

Also, I’ve been using cheap-o, thin Scott toilet paper for a few years, and it’s fine. I bust out the thick stuff now and then when we have company, but really, it’s not necessary. And while I’m on the toilet talk, get a dual flush for your toilet! You can save a lot of water, and you’ll notice the change in your sewer and water bills, too.
Tutorial here: http://www.younghouselove.com/2010/05/easy-upgrade-super-toilet/

No special litter bags. I use plastic grocery store bags. We have some from times that we forget cloth bags, but I also take them from both of my grandmothers when I visit them. And my mom saves her newspaper bags for me, so I use those for litter, and now for poop bags, too.

I try to, but that’s one that I almost always forget to bring them too. I can remember the grocery store since it’s an ordeal (coupons, making the list, dragging GGuy) but popping in Target to grab a YHL hook I almost always forget. But if I’m only grabbing one thing I just ask to not have a bag (which the cashier always looks at me like I’m nuts).

A good way for me to remember to bring the bags is to hang them on the inside handle of our front door so I can’t leave without noticing them and then I bring them to the car. I also try to have one of those bags that folds up in my purse at all times for when I’m out walking.

Question: What do you use to scoop your cat litter in if not plastic grocery sacks? I would love to use reusable grocery bags, but I use the plastic ones for litter. I feel guilty every single time the cashier asks about it though.

Thanks, Wendy! Any idea how those are better for the environment than other plastic bags though? I didn’t see anything on the product page other than it being Earth-rated, but it doesn’t say what that means.

If you need extra litter bags, also check out the front of the grocery store for the “Bag recycling”. A lot of them have a place to recycle old plastic bags, so just take some out of there to use if you don’t want to buy anything special.

I’ll need to try these out. I’m having the same conundrum since I got my cat — I used to have a lot of plastic bags but I’ve used them up for litter. I feel bad that I never seem to use my reusable bags anymore.

My family and I have always always used Scott toilet paper. It’s cheaper, and it doesn’t clog up toilets (some toilets don’t flush as well as others). I wouldn’t buy seventh generation for toilet paper since it’s more expensive and I’m sorry but I’m not spending a lot of money on toilet paper.

My family has always used Scott too, and I don’t really understand the hate people have for it. Then again, I HATE soft things – I can’t even stand to touch really soft toilet paper or cotton balls or velvet, and so on.

I feel kinda bad about the grocery bags, but I use them for my cat litter. I know I can buy bags like Wendy linked to, but it hurts to pay for bags when I can get them for free from Publix or Target.

A lot of grocery stores have a recycle bucket near the front entrance for clean used plastic grocery bags, at least in Virginia. What we don’t use for trash can liners and cat litter gets taken back to the grocery store for recycling.

15 minutes for your husband… so my estimate is that it will take me half an hour, which is not bad! Did you get the HYR270 model? I can’t quite tell which model is in the picture and there are two models on Amazon.

I like this a lot, Wendy! Especially swapping the napkins. I am so guilty of grabbing paper towels or napkins when really I could just grab a reusable towel instead and just rewash those. It’s more laundry (and thus water) though, so I don’t know if it quite evens out now that I’m thinking about it. I’ll give it a shot and see though!

It infuriates me too when it is easy. Unfortunately, in many places it’s not. It’s impossible to recycle in almost all of West Tennessee, for example. I’m pretty sure the only recycling facility is in Memphis there, even though there’s another city in that part of the state that needs one. Plus rural areas usually don’t have them either.
.
But omg, P’s boss actually gets mad at him for recycling, even though it literally doesn’t affect the boss at all because he doesn’t even work in this town. When he comes to visit, he’ll usually do something to sabotage the recycling. It’s ridiculous and infuriating.

That’s so crazy! One of our friends lives in a grad housing place, and his apartment didn’t come with the standard recycling bin so he just doesn’t recycle. Huh? He hasn’t bothered to call and ask for one. When ever we are over I’m tempted to bring my bottles/cans back home with me.

That is frustrating. We don’t have recycling bins provided to us by anyone, but we just bought our own. We paid five bucks for a bin to be able to do it, and we have to drive it to the facility ourselves too, but that only takes like ten minutes. It’s almost no effort.

We recycle, but we can’t recycle glass here in NOLA (no idea why). However, my in-laws in Knoxville, TN can, so our system is that whenever we are going to my in-laws or they come visit us, either we save up our glass and take it to them or they take it home from us and throw it in with their recycling. And when we go on a family vacation to Destin (where there is no recycling, apparently?), we take home the cans and plastic and they take home the glass. It’s a little weird to take “garbage” home (and weirder when it’s mostly wine bottles, since I really, really try to limit the products that come in glass that I buy), but I think it’s worth it. At the very least, I feel better about it than just throwing it away.

Yeah, I’m in Nashville and I can’t really recycle at home because my apartment building doesn’t have a contract for recycle collecting. And I can’t ask the city directly for a bin since I don’t live in a house. So basically, no recycling at all. My only options would be to go directly to the recycling facility, but that’s a couple of miles away and I don’t have a car. It’s not worth paying for a taxi so I can recycle my paper bags…
.
I have recycled all my life and it still makes zero sense for me to put my trash and my plastic/metal/glass in the same bags. So I bought a bin, and I fill it with recyclable items. Then when it’s full, I dump it in the trash container.

I thought about it for a while, but campus is about a 20 minutes walk, so even that is kind of a hassle. I would totally go to the recycling facility if I had electronics, paint, or other dangerous materials. But I don’t really see myself walking to campus with cookie boxes, cereal boxes, milk jar, and all of that. They usually don’t even have appropriate bin size for such items. They have small bins for things like paper, and maybe bottles/cans. That’s not what I need.

I’m pretty sure the best option would be to petition the apartment to provide recycling. I have about a full bin of recyclable every 4-5 days and the closest recycling facility would be a good 50 minutes away by bus. It would be wishful thinking for me to think my schedule allows bus trips like that. AND the fact to use a car or a bus to go to a recycling facility probably cancels the good that comes out of recycling anyway. That’s why a collect at the apartment would make more sense because the collecting truck is already out collecting all the recycling bins in our neighborhood.

We notice it when we go to the States – there are just not as many recycling bins…I usually have to hold on to whatever and get rid of it whenever I happen to see a bin whereas here – THE GTA – they are everywhere and always near a garbage so the choice to do it is a no brainer.
And our garbage pick up is limited to one bag per week so that you are forced to recycle (unlimited) and compost.

We shocked, really shocked when we went on our honeymoon to Hawaii and there was nowhere to recycle. It is so easy here and you would be shamed if you didn’t. Garbage pick up is paid for by homeowners but recycling pick up is free! Also in the city you aren’t allowed to put food scraps in your garbage can, they have pick up for that too.

I once worked in an office where they didn’t actually recycle anything, despite the various recycling bins. I saw workers outside pouring it all back into the trash and when I asked about it, apparently they weren’t allowed to recycle anything. It was so stupid, and deceptive too.

okay, this will really infuriate you. well, it did me. the guy I’m dating- overall wonderful, smart, handsome, etc. – threw away sticks he picked up from his yard! …In a plastic bag! I went to throw something into his outdoor trash bin and saw that! Aaaargh! I guess nobody’s perfect, but seriously??!

When I lived in North Dakota they didn’t recycle. It was so stupid. I literally bagged everything up and drove it 50 miles to the nearest recycling center. Sometimes I forgot it was in my trunk when I was driving home so when I got to Minnesota I realized I had brought ALL my recycling with. Haha.

I only require two household items to be brand named and good quality: toilet paper and garbage bags. I use way too much toilet paper according to Peter…who is apparently monitoring my tp use?
I have switched over all cleaning supplies to eco friendly brands at least. And I reuse those plastic shopping bags for bathroom garbage bags. I’m sorry environment. I suck. I’m pretty much guilty of all of these, except 17. I do have some cute fabric napkins though, I just always forget to use them. Same with the water bottles, grocery bags, gift bows and tupperware.

That’s adorable! I don’t pack lunches for myself though
And before you say get one for Lil – she loses them all the time. By lose, I mean hides them under her bed or in her backpack until they are growing new “food” so I gave up on the cute ones and have been having her use the brown paper ones or the little lululemon ones they give you for free.

I actually don’t eat lunch most of the time and if I do, its just chinese takeout or whatever. I’ve been trying to get healthier, so I just went grocery shopping and left everything at the office, so no need to pack anything.

Well, if you are guilty of almost all of these, you should commit to making some changes. If everyone like you made even a few easy changes, it would go a long, long way. But… if everyone just continues to say, “Eh, sorry, I suck!” we will continue to experience climate change at unbelievable rates and leave a really shitty planet for our kids and grandkids.

We do like 15 of these! Whoo! We’re looking into composting, but it’s not that convenient in our town. There is a company that will do it, but it’s $25 a month which is a little out of our budget. I’m thinking of making a small bin myself to keep on our back porch, but that seems a little over the top.

Only in America do people that it’s easier to:
1) drill for oil
2) ship oil to a manufacturing plant
3) turn the oil into a plastic
4) turn the plastic into a fork
5) ship said fork to a grocery store
6) drive to the grocery store to buy said fork
7) use said fork

I keep a set of cheap reusable silverware, plates, straws, and cups in my office so I can reuse them. I’m not perfect about it and occasionally it is easier to just grab a paper plate, but I do make a concerted effort. It’s so much easier to have a work set that I don’t have to worry about losing and that stays in my cube.

We were using paper products and plastic utensils in my office for YEARS, then someone was like, why don’t we buy cheap dishes? (we have a dishwasher, so it wasn’t a cleaning issue, just a laziness thing, I think) And we did, and it’s glorious.

My MIL uses paper and plastic everything for every dinner we do at her house. I would offer to do dishes, but they always have a million things in the sink, no where to put the clean/dry stuff from the dishwasher, and their kitchen is too small for me to wash while she’s cooking. So paper and plastic it is.

When we lived in a city, we would compost because we had a drop-off site (like Wendy). In our new small town, there is no centralized composting. I was all set to make this homemade, rollable compost container (http://thehappyhousewife.com/frugal-living/diy-compost-bin/), but was reminded that we have feral cats, raccoons, coyotes, etc in our neighborhood. Partner thinks we’ll attract too many wild animals to our yard. Any good tips on composting without attracting animals? Side note: partner studies bird conservation – so even if the animals don’t make a mess, he’s worried about them eating the birds that use our yard/open grassland for habitat/nesting. Thanks!

I compost in my back yard, the key is to not put any meat products at all in your compost pile. Fruit & veggie peelings, egg shells crushed up, coffee grounds, etc are fine. And layer it in with dead leaves, grass clippings etc. But NO meat, that is what draws the critters. I haven’t ever had a problem with animals & I live next to a wooded area.

I also live in a tiny town and compost all the time. But like gigi says – no meat. I actually just used an old tire and toss my vegetable/fruit/coffee scraps into the center of the tire – then I stir it regularly and add a lot of water. It’s great, has no unpleasant odor and no animals bother it. We have tons of deer in town and plenty of kitties, squirrels, raccoons, etc. running around – and we haven’t had a bit of trouble. The deer come into my yard regularly – but they are happy trying to kill my trees and don’t bother rooting through my compost pile.

And it’s SO good for my vegetable and flower gardens – I love it! It keeps my spirits hopeful for summertime yard work even in the middle of winter.

Thanks for this! In terms of environmental impact, reducing meat and dairy consumption is huge (like, way more important than buying local food). I think a lot of people still underestimate the magnitude of this.

I didn’t read the whole article, but do you know if fish is better than the other meats? Because I’ve been going pescatarian and I actually like it quite a bit. IDK if I could cut out that too (but I only eat it maybe 2 days a week, the rest are veggie only.)

I think fish are better in terms of carbon emissions, but they have different problems (overfishing of wild fish to the point of almost-extinction & aquacultures are also not environment-friendly unfortunately). I’d probably try to buy aquaculture fish with a strict ecological label, if you can find that. Jonathan Safran Foer (“Eating Animals”) turned me off from eating (sea) fish forever…

Ugh. trying to eat healthy and not terrible for the environment food is so hard! Not that that is going to stop us, it’s just like why isn’t food just food? It’s so ridiculous to me that everything is so processed and has such complex implications.

Funny story: My mother and her husband catch their own fish on a lake nearby. I thought that I’d try eating fish from there (and I probably will in the summer). But then I found out that the fish don’t just naturally live in the lake – they are PUT there. That is, the population is created in an artificial way only so that people can fish. I don’t know what to think of that.

It is called stocking the ___ whatever the body of water is. Lots of lakes/rivers do that for recreational fishing purposes. Usually they will indicate it on a sign or something if you are at a state park.

Yes. You buy it right from the farmer.
The farm I buy from raises their own cows, and kills/processes them themselves. A lot of small farms might have take their cows to a local processing facility just to conform with USDA Organic standards, but there’s a huge difference between that and what they do at huge meat processing facilities.

@Sas- I am blessed to live in an area that is huge in the local meat production world. I can visit farms and ask farmers how they slaughter their meat/where it is done. It is readily available at the Farmers Market, our local natural food stores, our chain natural food stores, and in all the local markets throughout town. So for me, it is easy. That said I know it is not as easy or affordable for everyone. I used to be strictly vegetarian and switched to eating meat recently but will only buy locally raised/slaughtered meat. It is easy for me to do this because I still don’t crave meat and have cooked it maybe 2x, but yeah it is possible.

I once went to a “Farmers Market” and asked where their cows were from and the person had no idea. They were basically selling grocery store meat and trying to pass it off as a Farmers Market. I didn’t buy any and refuse to go to that place ever again.

We had a “farmer’s market” here – in Canada – selling pineapple. PINEAPPLE. yeah – not so much. Now we drive about a hour away to farm country and buy local from the Mennonites to make sure the meat is grain fed, free roam, no hormones and antibiotic free. We go about 3 times a year and buy a whole bunch and just freeze it. The quality is palpable. And actually cheaper or comparable to price in the grocery store. It’s also a fun day – we grab some friends and make a little day trip of it.

I’m proud of myself, I do all of these things. I’m really cheap and many of these things are great ways to save money too! My work this week is having a competition of who can have the least amount of actual trash at home (with recycling and composting). It’s surprising just how much we can recycle! I already recycled but clearly not enough.

I personally never had good experience with CFLs and they don’t last that long for me. I’ve heard they burn out quicker if you turn lights on and off quickly a lot. I’m also not sure about the mercury. We’re trying to switch to LEDs which are even pricier but I’ve heard they’re better for the environment/last longer. But any switch is something.

That’s why I’m so confused by people who say it’s not worth the effort to recycle or make any of these other changes. I mean, you don’t have to do ALL of them, but it’s so easy to commit to a few of these things and help the environment and save money.

I agree! Though where I grew up, it was much harder to recycle because I didn’t have single stream recycling. I read somewhere that when neighborhoods do single stream recycling pick-up, 25% more stuff gets recycled.

Oh yeah, recycling options suck in a lot of areas. My parents have been recycling for 30+ years and their current town doesn’t have curb recycling pick up so they end up making weekly trips to a recycling center a few miles away. And I feel for @Miel because I didn’t have recycling at my apartment when I lived in Nashville, but I did have a car so I could drive it to a center. But there are other things you can do, like buying products that contain minimal packaging so there’s less to throw away or recycle overall. I took a Sustainable Living course years ago – we met once a week for 8 weeks and learned so much.

For cat people who want to ditch the bags altogether, I highly recommend checking out flushable litter. I’ve been using a wheat based one, and while it’s a little more expensive than the standard clay litters, not having to keep the bags in my main trashcan to perfume the apartment or slog to the trash chute that’s as far from my place as physically possible in the building every day is worth it! Plus no need to stockpile plastic bags

With regard to #21 though, my husband and I are phasing out CFLs for LEDs as our current CFLs bite it… which is a slow process because CFLs last for years! Their energy consumption is comparable, but LEDs start much brighter than CFLs (which have to warm up… which leads to me leaving them on when I don’t need them just so I don’t have to go through a warm-up again later) and aren’t as ugly as the standard twisty CFLs.

CFLs have mercury in them, handle them properly when they break and DON”T VACUUM it up.

Be careful with what you put down the drain, on your lawn, driveway. Wastewater treatment plants don’t always treat stormwater so anything you rinse in the street goes to the river. Some treatment plants aren’t equipped to treat what you put in the water so be cautious of what you put in the drains. Don’t pour old or leftover chemicals down the drain, take them to your city’s household hazardous waste collection points.

Dry cleaners produce large amounts of hazardous waste, best to avoid clothes that need dry cleaned at all.

My biggest environmental sin is probably the occasional flight and living in an old house with bad isolation (I’m renting in a city with severe lack of affordable apartments, so it’s difficult to be picky about this). I know that these two are huge carbon emission factors. I’m also worried about electronic equipment. I debated whether to get an ipad and so far I haven’t but I probably will at some point.

What infuriates me is much more all the waste created by institutions and companies than whatever single individuals do. We have those huge cafeterias on campus, and all of them, ALL OF THEM, use styrofoam plates, plastic utensil, plastic cups… nothing is reusable, nothing is biodegradable, nothing can be recycled… That’s so much waste created everyday, to serve many thousands people. When I’m next to that, eating my lunch out of tuperware, I’m just wondering if my actions have any effect. It’s easy to say “every action counts” but that’s only if “many people do it”. If I’m alone eating from a tuperware next to 12,000 people eating out of styrofoam, nothing changes.
.
In Quebec (and California?) they began charging for plastic bags at stores. Guess what, everybody switched to re-usable bags. And they used it, and they didn’t forget them, and it completely replaced plastic bags. That’s what I call a change. Those things don’t happen if it’s just “my individual action counts!”, we need actual society move!

Ok I do a lot of these things just to save money. Like my county charges 5 cents per bag you use, everywhere. This includes groceries, the shopping mall, the pharmacy, etc…And I use public transportation cause parking at my work is $13/day. But I hate CFLs with a passion and I refuse to switch over to the horrible blue/green glare. I just can’t. Also….shopping every day is really impractical and actually more expensive most of the time (vs buying chicken in bulk and freezing it). I mean I only buy what I eat that week, but not everyone has time to stop at the store every few days. And a lot of times people buy more than what they would’ve bought for just a week.

Yeah, as a single mom working full time and a daughter in after school activities, going to the grocery store daily just simply wouldn’t happen. I shop once a week and only buy meals/lunches for the upcoming week.

Re: CFLs – there are “warm” light CFLs that give off about the same kind of light as a typical old-fashioned light bulb and there are “cool” light CFLs that give off that ugly blueish institutional gross light.. I use only CFLs and am just careful that I buy the warm light ones!

Wait, people leave the water running while brushing their teeth?? For serious? I can’t even fathom that.

I do feel for people on the recycling. In my last town it was virtually impossible to do. The facilities just didn’t exist, so collecting it yourself and dropping it off wasn’t possible. So glad to be in a larger city that makes it easy on us.

At night I leave the water running while I brush my teeth because it takes sooo long for the water to warm up to wash my face. By the time I am finished brushing my teeth the water is usually warm enough to wash my face. If it warms up before I’m through I will turn it off until I am ready to use it. I just can’t wash my face with cold water unless I’ve been mowing in the hot sun or something like that

Something I do that isn’t on the list is I purchased a floor steamer and now use that on all my floors (except carpet – which we will soon replace anyway). I don’t have a bucket of dirty nasty water to dispose of and I feel like the steam cleaning is better for the environment. I don’t even own a mop anymore.

As someone who used to work for an electric company, some other easy ways to conserve electricity include putting your water heater on a timer to only run during the times that you are going to be showering or otherwise using hot water, running your pool pump more infrequently or putting it on a timer (if you have a pool, obviously), setting your AC at 78 degrees or higher in the warmer months (when you use it, of course. if you just want to open windows, that’s even better!) and 68 or lower when it is cold outside. Also, having those on a timer can save a lot of money too. For instance, if you aren’t home during the day you can have your AC set to 82 degrees and then on a timer to go down to 80, then 78 by the time you come home, and that will save money and electricity. And the planet!

You can also do a lot of good by just trying some old-fashioned cleaning “cures” instead of using really harsh chemicals. I do a lot of cleaning now with plain old vinegar and baking soda. You can also replace a lot of beauty products (which are often the product of harsh chemical production processes) with natural remedies. Apple cider vinegar is practically a panacea for beauty issues.
*
An aside: I knew someone who used to THROW OUT old clothes. I get that with underwear or completely threadbare, disgusting old things, but she would basically just throw out any clothes she didn’t want anymore. Right in the trash. It was an epiphany for her when I explained you can donate them. I know she’d heard of it, but I don’t think she or anyone in her family was in the habit of doing it. My whole life, if we were done with clothes, we: 1) ripped up the really threadbare ones and reused them as rags; 2) gave friends and family first pick of the nicer ones; 3) donated the rest. It just blows my mind that anyone would do otherwise.

when things are too gross/old to donate I turn them in to rags and use them around my place for cleaning! it works great. I also clean with vinegar/lemon on all my surfaces and use ACV for so much it is crazy.

You can rinse your hair with it to remove build-up. Just mix it with a little water and rinse it all through your hair. Then when you’ve rinsed it out, apply a combination of one egg, a quarter cup of yogurt, and a tablespoon of honey. Wrap your hair (with that “conditioner” still in it) in a towel for half an hour, to let the heat of your head set it. Then rinse it out and your hair will be healthy, shiny, and clean!
*
You can also use apple cider vinegar as a facial toner. (Or hydrogen peroxide — either one works.) Just swap your face with it on a cotton ball after washing, and before moisturizing.

You can also use apple cider vinegar to remove skin tags (I’ve read — I’ve never had them) but it sounds like a gross process and I’m not 100% sure it’s doctor-recommended. But basically you just soak a cotton ball in ACV, tape it to your clean skin with a bandaid, and sleep on it. In the morning the skin tag should fall right off.

A friend of mine has completely eliminated shampoo/conditioner from her life and now uses mostly apple cider vinegar. She explaned the process on her FB, but I can’t remember the specifics. I guess it takes a couple weeks for the buildup to work off your hair, but now she has this shiny fabulous magazine hair. I don’t know if I could do it, though since the smell of any vinegar makes me gag.

Oh and this might be kind of gross, I dunno, but I don’t bathe my kids that often. I let my oldest shower with me a couple of times a week and one bath on the weekend and then usually for the rest of the week it’s sponge bathing. My youngest is actually at a stage where she is terrified of the bathtub so most of her cleaning is in the form of a sponge bath but when I do subject her to the terror of bath time, I just fill a blow up baby tub with enough soapy water to bathe her and then use a cup at a time of clean water from the faucet to rinse her off, which seems to work better than having the water running constantly and trying to spray her with the showerhead.

What kind of bathing takes place ultimately depends on how dirty they are, but I’ve gotten pretty effective at cleaning the baby after mealtime without having resort to a bath. Luckily she pretty much lets me handle feeding her the messiest stuff so that helps. My oldest gets dirtier on the weekends because she plays outside a lot more, so usually she has a shower Saturday and her weekly bath on Sunday night, but then during the week she might only need one to two showers and the rest of the week, just a quick wipe down before bed. I forgot to mention that they both have pretty sensitive skin so in addition to using non-irritating skin products I try not to over dry their skin, so that is another factor for bathing them sparingly.

I mean it depends on how dirty you are I think. Like I work and office job and don’t exercise that often. So I honestly could go 3 or 4 days with out a shower. But say my dad who works out side, he HAS to shower daily or shit gets funky. So, maybe try showering every other day and see if it can work for you?

They also make earth friendly poo bags for your dogs, for you DW dog owners.

My bike was stolen several months back, and I’m so excited to get a new one so I can bike everywhere this summer. Unfortunately I live in a hilly neighborhood, but that just means my legs will be sexier.

Also! Car share. Denver has car2go, and we’re getting zipcar soon. I love car2go, I can usually find one within a few blocks of my apartment, and then I don’t have to drive around and waste time and money looking for parking, I can just ditch the car in a designated parking spot and go. And if you’re a car2go member it’s transferable city to city. I used my membership in Portland this past weekend!

Oooh! Also, turn off or dial back your heating or AC during the day, if you’re out of the house all day at an office job. In the winter, we actually keep the heat lower during the work week because we’re out of the house during the day and we’re just going to turn it back anyway at night when we’re cozy in bed, so the heat only really gets turned up higher on weekends when we’re around the house. In the summer, to conserve energy that would be used on AC, I just keep all the curtains closed, to keep the sunlight out, which keeps the place a bit cooler. You don’t have to keep the AC blasting all day just to make sure the house is cool when you come home.

Also on that note: dress for the freaking weather. It drives me nuts when people crank up the heat in the winter so they can lounge around in shorts and tank tops inside, then blast the AC in the summer so they can snuggle up in a sweatshirt in their living room. The point of HVAC is not to make the inside of your house the diametric opposite of the outside weather!! It’s just to maintain a comfortable norm.

Just get used to wearing snuggly sweaters inside! We keep the thermostat around 60 – 65 in the winter and it’s fine. Think about what you’re doing when you’re at home — if you’re on the couch, you can snuggle under a blanket. If you’re moving about, that will keep you warm anyway, and on top of that if you’re wearing a warm sweater and socks, you won’t really feel it. It’s the temperature of a mild spring day!

This drives me nuts too. Living in FL I constantly am overloaded by blasting AC. The worst are the places that blast the AC and leave the huge doors to the outside open. WTF people?? We’re trying hard not to use heat/AC. I got a fan to help with the AC issue, but it’s really hard to avoid running constantly when it’s in the 90s for 6 months at a time.

Along the same lines, I hate it when people don’t use the revolving doors in my building at work. They open the regular door and freezing cold air pours in in the winter (opposite in the summer), it just seems so wasteful.

I know, over-ACing drives me nuts. It seems to be worse the hotter the place is. DC and Baltimore have VERY hot and humid summers, but inside my office I have to wear a sweater. Not only is it wasteful, but it’s also gross — you’re covered in now-cold sweat and you have to wrap yourself up in a sweater? Ugh. I lived in Baltimore one summer with no AC. It wasn’t as comfy as having AC, obviously, but it was definitely survivable. Just leave the curtains closed during the day, flip your box fans (blow cool air in during the night, blow hot air out during the day), dress in light clothing, and dunk your hair in cold water if it gets really bad.

banana you have NO idea how angry this makes me. My roommate turned up the heat to 72-74 ( I keep it between 67 and 69) and did all f’ing winter long because she was “freezing” well I would look at her and she would be wearing booty shorts and a tshirt, in winter, to bed. And she has a thin threadbare comforter. Meanwhile I have a down comforter, sweats, thermal shirt, sweatshirt and wool socks with slippers. I would wake up sweating like drenched through my clothing and it just annoyed me because she wanted it to be like summer in the house and I am like no, that is not the point of heat or AC. And it just really this is my number 1 pet peeve with roommates. Seriously I am getting heated just thinking of it.

I am much better at following this kind of thing in the winter. I will barely use my heat, and when I do, it is pretty much just for the sake of the kiddos. Then, come summer, I try really hard to follow my own advice (AC at 78 or above, or higher if we aren’t home…) but I will be miserable the whole time because I just want to be cold! But I totally agree about dressing for the weather. If it’s cold outside, put leggings on under your sweat pants, and socks under your slippers!

We keep our house at 67 in the winter during the day and 60 at night. I love it because my kitties come and snuggle under the blankets with us to keep warm.
.
We have a swamp cooler at my house, instead of an A/C unit. Basically it’s a giant pad of water in front of a giant fan, so it blows cool air into the house. It only works in really dry climates. The only downside is that it’s in the window of one of the bedrooms, meaning the rest of the house doesn’t cool as well as that room does.

Also another really important environmental thing is proper disposal of medicine. You should NEVER flush medicine, and there are proper ways to throw it out too so that it doesn’t leach into the ground water/get in to our water supply and cause all sort of health/environmental factors effecting plant life, entire freshwater ecosystems and then us.

I use family cloth, mama cloth, cloth napkins, and cloth diaper. I hang dry pretty much everything, except for towels. I live in a rural area and we just have started getting recycling capabilities, so I am starting to figure out what they take and don’t take. I shop twice a month in large quantities and then once a week for produce. As a single mom, I just don’t have time to do much more than that, and it cuts back on waste. The end of the month is truly using up left overs and cleaning my pantry.

I wish we had public transportation, but we don’t. It would be a lot easier for so many reasons.

I’ve been working on #1 especially in regards to fruits/veggies. It helps that I have a few animals (rat, tortoise and bearded dragon) that eat them, so if I have too much, I can always give them extra.
#2 doesn’t work for me. I’m a complete ass snob. My mom and husband always joke about my “royal ass” because I love Charmin. I don’t *need* super soft and comfy TP, but I sure do want it and it’s one of the few things I buy as a “premium” product.
I already don’t buy new phones often. I tend to keep them for awhile because once I’m used to it I don’t want to start over. And I use a reusable Tupperware water bottle at work and when traveling (and cups at home), so we don’t buy bottled water. I do HAVE bottled water. I keep one case of it in my basement for emergencies, but that’s it.
I do quite a few of the other things as well (Using low energy bulbs, buying local, don’t drink at coffee shops – as opposed to bringing my own mug, etc).
.
Some things I’m willing to commit to:
-Definitely using the reusable bags. I mean, I have them! I just forget to use the damn things. So maybe I’ll keep them in the car. The only time I really remember is when we go to Costco (since we have gigantic Costco bags).
– Getting better at turning off the water when I’m not using it. I usually do when I’m brushing my teeth, but I could do better. I could aslo turn it off when I’m doing other things – washing my face, doing dishes, etc.
– Opting out of junk mail. I’ve thought about this forever and I always forget, but I’ll do that in the next month.

Just to brag on my city, Austin banned plastic bags altogether. You have to bring your reusable bags or some stores let you pay 10 cents per paper bag. It was annoying the first few months because we ALWAYS forgot our bags, but other than that it’s been great! Now it’s weird to go shopping in other towns and see all the plastic bags.

Really? I think that’s wonderful! I usually bring my own bags to stores if I remember. When I don’t remember, I’m always annoyed when they double bag and seem to give each item it’s own bag (well, it’s own double bag). I get home for 4 items and like 20 plastic bags, it’s ridiculous. Of course, I guess I’d bitch if I got one bag and the handle broke on my 1 mile walk home. Poor baggers, they can’t get a break.

1. Compost-able and disposable flatware made out of corn-starch. It is popular in San Francisco.
2. freecycle.org to pass on used items that you do not need but that have a lot of use left in them. I have many large items in my condo that I have picked up from freecycle.

Reusable bags- If you make a donation (I believe a $25 donation) to the World Wildlife Fund, they will send you four of their reusable bags. They are a perfect size for grocery shopping (not gigantic, so they can’t be overpacked by zealous baggers) and they have animals on them, so I am always complimented on my cute bags. And they are a plasticky finish as opposed to a cloth material (if you know what I mean) so they are totally durable and easy to clean if you spill or buy meat or something.
.
Junk mail- I just downloaded an app called PaperKarma (like, yesterday so I don’t know if it works or not) but you can take a picture of your junk mail and they do the unsubscribing for you. I am allegedly already off six mailing lists
.
Used books & dvds- I love taking my used books and dvds to Half Price Books (even though you don’t get very much and I always spend more than I get), and I also have gotten rid of dvds on swapadvd.com. They have a cd and book swap site as well but I haven’t used those.